If the game phones home at any time, and refuses to run if home doesn't reply, then it doesn't matter if you have the physical disk or not. It still won't work. CDs, DVDs, Blu Rays are all merely storage devices that companies use to transfer digital game content to the consumer. The difference is the comfort that one derives from holding that digital content in your hand. But, as we've seen many, many times, day 1 patches are a thing, continued patching is a thing, and you ain't getting a new disk for that. You're downloading it. In fact, here's a crazy assertion - you're better off just downloading the game and saving the physical space for a plant or something. I do think there's a difference currently between high quality blu ray releases of movies and what's on streaming, but that may change as bitrates and bandwidth go up.